Craven, who grew up in Weymouth, Massachusetts and competed for the UMass Boston men’s lacrosse team as a student-athlete, comes to Becker following a six-year stint as the Emmanuel College men’s lacrosse assistant coach.

NoontimeSports.com caught up with the Hawks’ new head coach to discuss the role and goals for the program heading into the 2017 season.

What intrigued you about this position?

This position offers me a chance to lead a program that has great potential. I have followed the program from afar because of their former ties to the Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC). I see potential to take this program to the next level. The academics at the school are very good and I can’t even keep track of the number of awards and ‘best of lists’ the school is on.

Tell me about your experience at Emmanuel – how did you assist Coach McWilliams in turning the Saints into a conference champion the past three seasons?

We literally had to build everything from the ground up at Emmanuel. Brendan McWilliams had a vision that was clear and to the point, and he worked to convince the administration to do lots of things to assist the program. Brendan worked extremely hard to build this program – I just followed his lead – but after two years of explaining our program’s goals and initiatives, as well as what the institution could offer from an academic perspective, we started attracting players that bought into our system and ran with it.

How did Coach McWilliams help you improve as a coach?

Coach McWilliams taught me so much over the last six seasons. It’s easy to point at the X’s and O’s, but he taught me more about how to be an effective coach. He taught me the humility and professionalism that goes along with being a professional coach. It’s easy to just show up and roll the balls out and say ‘do it,’ but he took time to show me the right way to do things. He taught me that the right way isn’t always the easy way and that the team always comes first.

What sort of offensive and defensive styles do you hope to implement with the Hawks?

I am a defensive guy, so I would like to implement some of the things that we used at Emmanuel. We got lucky and recruited a great group of defenders early on, so our defense was always a little more advanced than our offense. Hopefully I can make a similar transition with Becker. As for our offense, I have a style in mind that I want to implement. Everyone wants to run an attack similar to Tufts, so the offense will be a work in progress with an end goal in mind.

What goals and objectives do you hope to accomplish as the head coach of the Becker men’s lacrosse team?

We want to compete at the highest level possible. At Emmanuel, we set out to build a competitive program that could compete against the best teams in Division III, and the squad is in a better place than it was in year one. At Becker, we want to win the New England Collegiate Conference (NECC) – that is our first goal. We also want to position ourselves for a Pool B bid for the NCAA Tournament. And finally – speaking collectively as team – we want to get better everyday and make sure we prepare our student-athletes to win lacrosse games, but also in life. Wins and losses will happen, but one of my biggest goals for the program is preparing these student-athletes for future success beyond the lacrosse field.